Tansy Rayner Roberts Quotes

I don't think many people stare at people in wheelchairs because we see it regularly. I suppose if you see more in the media it will take away the curiosity.

People tend to treat people with disabilities sort of like they're aliens from another planet. It doesn't come from a bad place; it comes from a place of, 'I have no idea what this disability entails, and I don't want to offend anyone or make them feel awful.'

Most people assume that autistic people are not capable of empathy.

Once you understand that someone has Tourette and that they can't help their tics, it takes away the distraction. And you can engage your compassion. You feel for them. You embrace them.

Many may look at me and see mostly what I have lost. I struggle to speak, my eyesight's not great, my right arm and leg are paralyzed, and I left a job I loved representing southern Arizona in Congress.

It's undeniable that what we are taught as a culture to believe about disability is at odds with traditional notions of masculinity.

As I grew up, I became aware that there are people with special needs out there, and I have a real connection with them.

We're normal people. Don't be scared because we are in a chair. People don't understand that. They think, 'Oh, a wheelchair, something's wrong with their heads, something's just not right.' Well yeah, we may be a little twisted, but no more than anyone else.

I'm a human being, I'm not a machine. I'm 72. I'm dyslexic.

I'm definitely more understanding of people who have disabilities and who are suffering.

I thought being in the wheelchair might be kind of limiting for me as an actor. It turned out cool in a lot of ways. Of course, at the end of the day, I can get up out of the chair and go home, but I'm very acutely aware that most people can't, so I try to give the situation that depth.

HIV does not make people dangerous to be with. So you can shake their hands and give them a hug. Heaven knows they need it.

Until everyone knows someone who has died of AIDS this prejudice and discrimination will continue.

I didn't know anything was wrong with me when I was growing up. I thought everyone went to occupational and speech therapy, I thought these were common things. I thought I was quite normal until I went to school and someone told me it wasn't normal to have a disability.

What we want is that one day every workplace will be diverse - we already encourage that with gender and ethnicity, but the next frontier is neurodiversity and it will become ordinary. People won't think twice about it.

I've had lots of fans who come out and say, 'Listen, I can relate to Cyborg because I lost a limb,' or 'I have this cochlear implant.' It's one of those things when you actually start seeing it, when you actually start hearing about it, that made Cyborg more relevant to me than I think he ever had been up until that point.

I grew up with a special-needs brother, and the separation from other kids is so extreme. We've got to break down those barriers.

There's a wide variety of diversity, with people that have disabilities from R.J. Mitte in 'Breaking Bad' to Danny Woodburn being a little man.

It is so important for young people to see characters with different mental health challenges on-screen.

There are lots of people with mental health disabilities, and that's just the way their life is; it's not like you see it in the movies.

I don't generally talk about medical terms when I discuss my position as a disabled person. I take a social rather than medical approach to disability, and so long Latin names for congenital conditions are not relevant.

I have friends struggling with autism, juvenile diabetes.

Although there exist many thousand subjects for elegant conversation, there are persons who cannot meet a cripple without talking about feet.

I think what's important is to give space to the range of human experience.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm as famous for my wheelchair and disabilities as I am for my discoveries.